Fashion Project - Studio Shoot, Submission Requirements and Evaluation Guidance

Studio shoots for your garments are arranged for the first day back - we have 4 photographers from the second year working with you, and studios 1 & 2 are both booked from 1.00pm until 2.30pm - this should allow time to get collection and individual shots for everyone. Make sure you have your garment, model, plus any make up or other clothing you need to set your piece off effectively.
We will distribute edited shots from the shoots for use in your folios as soon as possible, but we won't expect to see these as part of your project submission.


The deadline for your Fashion work is Tuesday 5^th January @ 4.30pm and this is the minimum you need to have in your sketchbooks:

Initial Research and Presentation:

• Observational drawing/s of your object.
•  At least 2 busy pages of visual research into your garment, different versions/styles/shapes, try to find inventive Haute Couture versions.
• Minimum 2 pages of visual research into your object - different versions, different uses, unusual applications of your object, if you can find examples of it in Fashion then include these.
• 2 pages where you find examples of Collections. Most designers/design houses release themed collections seasonally, look for examples of collections that are inventive, exuberant and perhaps use elements of recycling – for example the work of Martin Margiela.
• Copies of your presentation slides.
• Any notes relevant to your presentation.

Illustration and Design Development:

• 4 pages research into 2 Fashion Illustrators.
• Your photos from the figure (the ones you used as a basis for your Fashion Illustrator responses).
• 4 Well finished Illustrator responses based on your photos.
• 6 garment proposals (with notes, using the templates).
• A finished Illustration based on your best design - this should be developed independently and not based on an existing template. This might include sample pieces, annotations and colour swatches alongside.

Final Garment, Photography and Evaluation.

• 4 pages research into 2 Fashion Photographers.
• Your finished garment/accessory.
• A thoughtfully styled location shoot of your garment - be ambitious, think about the photographers whose work you have studied. Arrange model, location, props, make up. Consider posture and camera angle carefully. Take plenty of shots (20+) you might use PhotoShop to enhance your best shots for inclusion in your sketchbook.
• Your word processed evaluation (see guidance notes below). 

RECYCLED FASHION EVALUATION GUIDANCE

In order to pass this project you must complete a word processed evaluation of 500-800 words, discussing the following ……

• What object and garment did you get to work with?
• How did the development of your Presentation help in understanding the possibilities offered by your object. What sources did you access in researching your object and garment?
• In what other ways did you respond to and investigate your object? (e.g. photography and drawing)
• Who were you collaborating with? How did you share tasks? Do you think you communicated effectively together? Did you find this collaboration helpful?
• Which designers/collections did you look at? What appealed to you about their work?
• What did you learn from looking at the designer’s work? Did their work influence your own garment designs later in the project?
• What were your first ideas for your garment design? Did these bear much relation to your final solution?
• What was it that appealed to you about the fashion illustrators you chose to research and respond to?
• What did you learn from recreating the styles of the illustrators you looked at, and how did this help you to understand the techniques employed in fashion illustration?
• How did you go about creating your own fashion illustrations – what processes did you employ in developing your final images? Describe how you used photography to style them initially and what you did to get them to a high standard.
• Which Fashion Photographers did you research? What appealed to you about their work?
• Describe the process you went through to create your initial garment designs, and how you decided upon the one you chose to make.
• What elements of your original garment did you retain and what was added/taken away?
• What materials and techniques did you employ in the production of your final garment and what problems did you encounter along the way?
• Discuss your final photoshoots, how did you style your garment? Mention aspects such as make up, props, location, models, postures, lighting, composition.
• Do you feel your final garment will work well with your collaborators? Did you maintain good communication throughout the project?
• What do you regard as the most and least successful aspects of your project?
• How well did you manage your time and what you would do differently if you did this project again?

Fashion Project Time Planning

OK, so you should all be well underway with garment construction by now. Make sure you have the resources you need: as many multiples of your object as your garment requires and potentially a base garment to reconstruct/work over. You may need other things such as additional fabrics, dyes, zips, clasps, velcro etc.
This weekend may be a good opportunity to shop for any bits that you are currently short of. If you have an ambitious plan it is essential to work in a focussed way to resolve it properly.
In order to carry out Studio Photography before Christmas (see post below) it is essential that garments/accessories are fully finished by Monday 14th December. So the big aim next week is the completion of your making process. We will let you know precise times for the studio shoots soon - these may be outside normal lessons, dependent on availability of the Studios and the Photographers.
Ideally we would like all items from each collection (e.g. All the Clothes Peg garments and accessories from across both groups) to be available for photography together - so you will need to try and obtain models (or model yourself) at the relevant times.
Any finishing work to your illustration research/design development needs to be completed as self-directed study now. See previous posts for the sketchbook requirements up to this point.
From now until the project is submitted (straight after the Christmas break) the things that need to be added to sketchbooks are:

• Some photographic documentation of stages of your making process, with annotation/explanation.
• Images from your studio photoshoot - these will need to be obtained from the second year photographers you will be working with.
• Contact sheets and larger prints of the best images from a location shoot.
• 4 pages of research into 2 Fashion Photographers (see post below for guidance).
• Word-processed Project Evaluation - guidance for this will be issued.

Fashion Photography - Your Shoots & Research Guidance.

In the final week of term we will be arranging studio shoots with some of the second year students who are specialising in Fashion Photography - we will then get them to edit and distribute the best shots for you to include in your projects. It will be useful to ensure that you have a USB memory stick available to copy shots from the Photographers as hi-res PhotoShopped images are usually too large for sending via email or saving to your limited college network space.
Thinking a little way ahead you should start giving some thought to your location Photoshoot - this could be completed over the Christmas break, but your planning should start now. You should be aiming for a professional approach with this that results in great imagery for your portfolio.
Consider who will model for you (or who will take photos if you are modelling your own garment), where you will base the shoot (what will complement the garment?), will you need props/make up?

In order for you to plan and execute effective final Photoshoots for your garments it will be helpful to make yourself aware of the work of some top Fashion photographers.
When looking at these Photographers work you should look for the following things and comment on them:

• Use of location/studio - how does this relate to enhance the garment?
• Use of make up.
• Use of props.
• Use of the model(s) consider things like body posture, what mood is the photographer trying to create?
• Use of lighting - natural/artificial? harsh/gentle?
• Composition/cropping - how is the figure placed within the image?
• Use of post production - has the image been manipulated via software such as PhotoShop to achieve the final result, how subtle/dramatic is this process?

You should look at 2 of the following photographers and provide a little background biographical information before analysing at least 3 images by each one in detail (2 pages per photographer, print out decent size reproductions of their work).

Steven Meisel

Corrine Day

Mario Testino



Ruven Afanador

Nick Knight

Perou

Tim Walker

Steven Klein

Progress Reviews (Ivan's Group)

On Thursday next week we will be taking a day off the normal timetable to do 1:1 progress reviews. You need to ensure you are in for your scheduled appointment. I will be doing the reviews in the little section of the IT room next to our teaching studio. The studio will be available for working if you are coming in before or staying after your appointment - please use it!
Appointments are as follows:

Progress Review 1:1s Thursday 26th November
9.00	Imogen Andrews
9.15	Emma Knight
9.30	Rosie Millard
9.45	Lauren Day
BREAK
10.15	Krista Kurcina
10.30	Mia Dove
10.45	Sofia Vincent
11.00	Zoe Ireland
11.15	Laura Smith
11.30	Sophie Armour
11.45	Sara Armstrong
12.00	Ruby Cover
LUNCH
1.00	Melissa Mullis
1.15	Sam Thompson
1.30	Katie Bennett
1.45	Taylor Isaac
2.00	Evie Messenger
2.15	Kyle Freeman
2.30	Abi Booley

 Paul will arrange reviews with his Tutor Group in the near future.

Illustrator Responses

OK, to ensure you are all crystal clear about what you should be doing over the next couple of days. What we want you to achieve is 4 beautiful responses to your 2 chosen illustrators using your own photos as the basis for these illustrations.

So you will need:

• A collection of images by your 2 illustrators - enough to get a really good feel for their style, technique and media.
• A range of photographs from the figure - try to get some good dynamic poses that have the feel of Fashion illustration/photography. If you are unsure what you are aiming for then flick through a few copies of Vogue and look at the fashion shoots and advertising images.
• The appropriate media to respond to your illustrators, identify what they use and do likewise. If their work is produced digitally then don't try replicating it by hand.

Once you have all these things you need to really focus on making some impressive responses that capture the feel of each Artist. Use the lightbox to start your drawings from your own photos off if it helps. You might want to use software to extend and stretch the figures in your photos and achieve something closer to the classic fashion illustration proportions (which are quite different to the real proportions of the human body).

Here's an example of what I'm talking about:

Raw photo file

Digital Illustration by Jocelyn Gravot



Digitally developed response to Jocelyn Gravot

Fashion Ilustration Research & Development

You need to research the work of 2 fashion illustrators, here are a few good links to explore:

http://www.dripbook.com/top/browse/illustration-portfolios/fashion/

http://www.illustrationweb.com/styles/fashion

http://www.illustrationdivision.com/

Anna Higgie

Try to choose illustrators that have contrasting approaches and use different media, as you are going to have to respond visually to these illustrators BE REALISTIC and select styles you are confident you can reproduce effectively. For each selected illustrator print out 3/4 reproductions of their work at a reasonable size (A5ish).

You then need to provide some analysis of each illustrator. Find out what you can about them - where they trained, who they have worked for. Most importantly analyse the images you have chosen, identify what media have been used and discuss technique (expressive or controlled?), composition, use of colour. Give your personal opinion on the work, but ensure you give reasons for the views you express.

Present the work thoughtfully (2 A3 pages per illustrator), think about layout and text/titles etc.

Developing your own illustration work involves a number of stages:

• Using body templates we have distributed come up with a quick range of 6-8 design proposals for your garment (consider conversations you have had with your team when designing - e.g. if you have decided on theme colours or shapes then use them in your proposals).
• Do the Fashion Illustrator research as detailed above.
• Take a range of dynamic photos from the figure. Using a studio environment for this will be advantageous (either book the photography spaces in the Stevens block or at least use the booth and lights in the Art Department). Look at Fashion shoots and advertisements to get ideas about suitable poses, enter into the spirit of it and avoid "wooden" poses.
• Using your own photos as a basis produce two Fashion illustrations in the style of each Fashion Illustrator you have researched (4 images in all), make sure you use the most appropriate media. Take time over this and aim for some professional looking illustrations. See separate post for an example of this.

Having produced some design proposals and hopefully gained some knowledge about Fashion illustration styles the next stage is to put these two things together:

• In the last phase of the illustration you need to create a polished illustration of your final selected Design proposal. Again use your own photographs as the basis for this, but try to create a personal illustrative style. You might integrate elements of the techniques/media of the Artists you studied, but you should be aiming to take this final image further, and create something more personal.

Fashion Sketchbooks

So what should be going into your sketchbooks over the first week/10 days of this project?
Well, one reason behind using photography to record your Moodboards and not sticking everything down is that it means that the material you have gathered is then available for inclusion in your sketchbook.
So once you have got good photos of your Moodboards you need to divide (and potentially duplicate) the visual material amongst your design teams, and then compile the following:

• 4 Sketchbook pages of visuals and information on your garment/accessory. Different versions - traditional and radical, history, definition.
• 4 Sketchbook pages of visuals and information on the object you need to recycle. History, typical uses, unusual uses, previous applications in Fashion.
• 2 Pages showing some examples of collections, ideally exploring some recycling, try looking at Martin Margiela and Jez Eaton for starters. Provide some analysis.
• One or more good observational drawings from your object.
• Printouts of all the slides from your presentation.

After the Presentations are complete we will start to explore approaches to Fashion Illustration, responding to existing Illustrational styles, before trying to develop a more personal style with which to illustrate your own design proposals.

TRASHION Presentation Schedule

It is great to see lots of sophisticated Moodboards taking shape already, people have started the new project in a very positive way. If you have gathered lots of valuable imagery for each slide/moodboard you could produce 2 slides for each part of the presentation, but do make sure you are being selective and consider layout carefully. Any text you include should be at a scale that will be legible when your image is projected as a slide.

Student teams in each teaching group (upstairs and downstairs) with the same object need to compile and deliver their own slideshow, however some wider teamwork is to be encouraged – so sharing of ideas, information and images with your equivalent team in the other room is healthy.

Judging by where people are at it is realistic to aim for giving presentations next Wednesday – all group members should contribute to the delivery of the presentation, so planning who will say what is a good idea. You will need to explain and expand upon the visuals you put up on screen (don’t just read text off the slide). Preparing and using cue cards is likely to be helpful. Presentations need to last between 5 and 10 minutes, speak clearly (and not too fast), face your audience and most importantly practice your delivery as a group in advance. When you practice try timing your presentation to ensure it is of a suitable length.

Presentation Schedule (Upstairs Group/Ivan’s TG). Wednesday 18th November
Time	Group
10.30am	Paper Plates (Krista, Sophie, Emma)
10.40	Disposable Cutlery (Ruby, Taylor, Laura)
10.50	Plastic Cups (Evie, Mia, Abi)
11.00	Envelopes (Melissa, Katie)
11.10	Drinks Cans (Samuel, Sara)
11.20	Cardboard Tubes (Sophia, Rosie M)
11.30	Clothes Hangers (Imogen A, Zoe)
11.40	Clothes Pegs (Kyle, Lauren D)

 

Presentation Schedule (Downstairs Group/Paul’s TG). Wednesday 18th November
Time	Group
1.05pm	Disposable Cutlery (Vicki, Lauren P, Bertie)
1.15	Clothes Hangers (Amy, Beth, Tash)
1.25	Clothes Pegs (Shirley, Livvy, Charlie)
1.35	Paper Plates (Imogen B, Stan)
1.45	Plastic Cups (Rosie H, Elfie)
1.55	Envelopes (Chris, Molly)
2.05	Drinks Cans (Will, Levi)
2.15	Cardboard Tubes (Tanisha, Georgia)